DAILY MEDITATION: “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed… Nothing will be impossible for you”
Liturgical day: Saturday of the Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Gospel text (Mt 17,14-20): A man came up to Jesus, knelt down before him, and said, 'Lord, have pity on my son, who is a lunatic and suffers severely; often he falls into fire, and often into water. I brought him to your disciples, but they could not cure him.' Jesus said in reply, 'O faithless and perverse generation, how long will I be with you? How long will I endure you? Bring the boy here to me.' Jesus rebuked him and the demon came out of him, and from that hour the boy was cured. Then the disciples approached Jesus in private and said, 'Why could we not drive it out?' He said to them, 'Because of your little faith. Amen, I say to you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.'
“If you have faith the size of a mustard seed… Nothing will be impossible for you”
Fr. Fidel CATALÁN i Catalán
(Terrassa, Barcelona, Spain)
Today, once more, Jesus teaches us that miracles are measured by the measure of our faith: “Amen, I say to you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move” (Mt 17, 20). In fact, as St. Jerome and St. Augustine point out, in working out our saintliness (something clearly exceeding our own forces) we are actually in the process of “moving mountains”. Miracles do exist, and if we do not see more of them is just because with our little faith, we do not let him make them.
Before a disconcerting and incomprehensible situation human beings react in many different ways. Epilepsy was considered an incurable illness, which was suffered by those possessed with evil spirits.
The father of that creature expressed his love for his son by begging Jesus for his total healing. His behavior is shown as a true act of faith. He kneels down before Jesus and begs him directly intimately convinced that his request will be favorably attended to. How he expresses his request shows at the same time the full acceptance of his personal condition and the recognition of the mercifulness of He that may feel sorry for others.
That father mentions the apostles have not been able to get rid of that devil. This element introduces Jesus' instruction while pointing out the little faith of his disciples. To follow him, to become his disciple, to collaborate in his mission demands a profound and well based faith, capable of supporting adversities, setbacks, difficulties and incomprehension. Faith is effective only when it is strongly rooted. In other evangelic fragments the same Jesus refers to the lack of faith of his followers. The expression “nothing will be impossible for you” (Mt 17, 20) points out with all its strength to the importance of our faith to follow the Master.
God's Word places before us the thought about the quality of our faith and the way how we get deeper into it while reminding us that father's attitude by approaching Jesus and pleading with all the strength of his loving heart.
Source: evangeli.net